Jury Finds For Woman In Tradoc Race Case

Civilian Employee Awarded Lost Wages

June 19, 1999|By TOM FREDRICKSON Daily Press

NORFOLK — A federal jury has awarded $135,000 to Ellen Dunn, a black civilian employee at Fort Monroe who says she was a victim of racial discrimination.

U.S. District Judge Jerome B. Friedman declined to certify the lawsuit as a class-action on behalf of black Training and Doctrine Command employees with civil service rankings from GS9 through GS12. The lawsuit alleged the Army engaged in a "continuing practice of discrimination" at TRADOC headquarters at Fort Monroe.

The jury found for the Army against co-plaintiff Richard Reaves. The judge dismissed a case of a third plaintiff, Arneda Powell.

After a three-week trial in Norfolk, the jury found last week that Dunn was the victim of retaliation for leveling discrimination charges against the Army. She was passed over on promotions she deserved, according to her attorneys, Kenneth M. Robinson and Nicholas H. Hantzes.

TRADOC is the unit of the Army that formulates and writes policies and training procedures.

Friedman is expected to decide whether to approve the jury's findings within eight weeks and, if he upholds them, determine a figure for lost wages. The Army's total payout likely would total about $270,000, Robinson said. The federal government is immune from paying punitive damages.

Dunn, 48, was paid about $63,000 in her position as a writer and editor. Her job title was doctrine literature analyst, and she had a civil service rating of GS12. She was fired about a year ago. That fact, the subject of a separate administrative hearing, was kept from jurors, though they knew she received a notice of termination.

The lawsuit originated as a formal class action complaint in 1996 within the government's administrative review system. Dunn acted as class representative. Memos dating back to 1994 labeled Dunn a "whistle-blower and trouble-maker," Robinson said.

In the administrative proceeding, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference civil rights group presented data the organization said showed unequal treatment of blacks and whites. Between 1991 and 1995, according to Dunn's complaint, blacks occupied 22 percent of the TRADOC workforce and received 10 percent of the promotions. Meanwhile, whites occupied 74 percent of the workforce and received 86 percent of the promotions.

The Army, represented by the U.S. Justice Department, denied the validity of the numbers in its response to Dunn's complaint.

The Army declined to comment this week in the wake of the jury's decision. "Now our attorney is reviewing the case," said Major Gary Kolb, who works at the public affairs office at Fort Monroe. "While he is working on it, we can't comment."

Among the allegations raised in Dunn's lawsuit, TRADOC discriminated by:

* maintaining more onerous performance standards for blacks than whites;

* using a "surplus" list of jobs that could be downsized to remove blacks from the workforce and deny promotions to blacks.

Blacks' rate of promotion has improved in the past two years, Robinson said, crediting the lawsuit and other actions that called attention to the charges of unequal treatment.

The improvements may mean a class-action lawsuit is no longer needed, he added.

Another employee who has sued TRADOC also said things have changed for the better. "I think since Ellen Dunn's legal action there have been a number of promotions of African-Americans," said Phyllis Dudley, a secretary at TRADOC. "But before that, things were awful."

The Army's Kolb wouldn't confirm that blacks are now getting a bigger share of the promotions.

Robinson said the "smoking gun" in the case was a memo from a white woman alleging reverse discrimination. It referred to a new GS13 position within TRADOC that Dunn and the woman were eligible for.

The announcement of the new position was postponed until after a representative of the SCLC could meet with the undersecretary of the Army.

The memo indicates that the idea was to keep the SCLC representative from having something more to complain about at the meeting - the selection of a white employee for the GS13 position.

Rather than giving the job to the white employee, TRADOC decided to withhold approval until an independent review of Dunn and the other employee's qualifications, Robinson said.

When Dunn was found to be the best qualified for the position, TRADOC regraded it to GS12 and awarded it to the white woman, rather than promote Dunn, Robinson said.

In her memo, the white candidate said the Army was buckling under fear of racial discrimination charges in ordering the audit and canceling the newly rated position.

Dunn received work evaluations of "outstanding" for 10 years, 1984 to 1993.

After filing an administrative complaint with the equal employment officer, her performance rating was downgraded from outstanding to "highly successful."

Tom Fredrickson can be reached at 247-4965, or by e-mail at tfredrickson@dailypress.com